


who you were (who you become)

by arochill



Series: Lakefront (Modded SMP) [3]
Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Angst, Flash Fic, Gen, Hybrids, No Dialogue, Phantom Hybrid Wilbur Soot, Self-Worth Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-17 04:41:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 841
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29465931
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arochill/pseuds/arochill
Summary: Wilbur doesn’t like thinking about the past. It doesn’t help that he doesn’t remember much about it in the first place. There is something hollow inside him – left behind alongside the memories he lost when his phantom genes finally decided to show.He wasn’t sure who he was now. He just knew that this lake was home once, and it always would be.
Series: Lakefront (Modded SMP) [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2157234
Comments: 9
Kudos: 165





	who you were (who you become)

There was a time, a long time ago, where Wilbur was able to stand under the light of the sun and just _breathe._ It was long before dormant phantom genes pushed their way to the surface and dominated so much of his life. It was before his body faded out of existence more often than not. If Wilbur was completely honest, he didn’t remember much of the _before._ If he was honest, he didn’t know if he really cared to remember in the first place.

He wasn’t sure if the before was a life he wanted to remember in the first place.

It was life that held a Wilbur that had long since stopped breathing under the sunlight. He knew that, just as he knew Niki looked at him sometimes like she had lost something. He knew that, just as he knew that it was a life he would never be able to get back.

It wasn’t difficult to accept, especially when he didn’t know what he lost in the first place.

Unlike other hybrids that grow into their other half, the phantom gene doesn’t become active until the person holding it dies. It’s a dormant gene that waits and, when it finally rises to the surface, it _burns._ It burns more than direct sunlight, more than a hot iron. Wilbur didn’t remember much about his death. He just knew that feeling everything become so less permanent and _real_ hurt in a way he would never truly be able to describe.

When Wilbur first met Phil, the older hybrid had looked at the bones that should have been wings on Wilbur’s back with a sadness and understanding that left Wilbur almost unable to breathe. The next day they met, Phil brought a spare bucket hat with him that he had given to Wilbur. The week after, Phil had gifted him with a hooded cloak that both protected his should-be wings and body from the sunlight.

(He didn’t remember much of his past, but he knew the care he was being given was something new. He fought himself hard to try and make sure he didn’t lose it.)

It was strange, Wilbur thought, to need to be helped. To _want_ to accept that help.

He still didn’t understand these hybrid aspects of himself in the way everyone else had long since learnt to, and it left him falling behind in conversations and the activities that those around the lake participated in.

Niki dragged him into her side of the lake whenever she could, making jokes about what he was and pushing him to do the same about her. She laughed when he faded from view, cheered when he phased through objects. She held his hands tight in her own when she couldn’t see him and he didn’t know how to bring his body back into existence.

Phil was just as kind about it all. He helped bring Wilbur back to the ground when he began to hover above it without realising. He made sure Wilbur didn’t forget to eat, because if there was one thing that hadn’t changed from when he was alive it was how big his appetite was.

None of the hybrids picked on him for not knowing what it meant to be one of them. Those around the lakefront helped to get used to the house he had built when he was alive again – making a joke about it being a haunted house was easy when your other side was a phantom.

It was different though. It was _difficult._ Difficult to breathe, because he didn’t _need_ to now. Difficult to move, to exist, when the world tried to burn him out of it. He didn’t know if he would ever be able to understand himself in the way his friends seemed to.

The world didn’t want him in it.

He didn’t remember the before. He wasn’t entirely certain that the world _should_ want him in the first place.

Above all else, Wilbur didn’t truly _mind_ that he had to die to become what he now was. As much as he hated it for changing him in a way he didn’t understand and probably never would, it gave him a kinship with his friends that he _knew_ he never had beforehand.

It was refreshing in a way he knew he would never be able to properly explain, even if someone asked him to.

He was fine with it, if he was being completely honest.

He didn’t _want_ to remember. He wanted to hold tight to the relationships he had been given along with his new form, and he wanted to continue holding on for as long as they allowed him to.

There was a burning in his soul – a burning that lit under a fire called _family._ And it was the only burning that Wilbur would continue to kindle for as long as they wanted him.

He hoped it would last forever.

(He hoped that who he was before, who he might still be, wouldn’t make him lose them all.)

**Author's Note:**

> do i know what the plot of this is? no not really. not my favourite thing i’ve written, i just felt like writing something short for phantom wilbur. will probably write something longer for him at some point. hope you enjoyed this though :) thank you for reading <3


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